[DISCUSSION] Expand on access to Slack and reasons why we use it

[Lextuga007]

Some people's organisations either restrict the app and not the web browser but some are very strict and have to get permission from very senior people. We could detail why we use Slack. Starting with some points:

• This offers cross organisational and public access to anyone who is interested in health and care open source analytics.
• This supports the principles of openness and transparency that NHS-R Community demonstrates in its activities.
• This offers a no cost solution to communication.
• We use this to facilitate discussion rather than transactions Q&As in events like conferences.
• We are mindful of the difficulty of establishing communication in any channel and any move to either another workspace or system can change or stop this communication.

[jasonpott]

Positives:

• No limits on user numbers
• Recognisable platform
• Free
• Open source alternatives suffer from technical debt and hosting costs or are seen as less professional.
• NHS-R is a volunteer community so no-cost solutions are favourable.
• Good mobile and web clients that are typically accessible in NHS environments i.e. not blocked by the firewall.
• Many technical individuals are already users of slack for other communities so adding a channel is a low bar to entry.
• Intuitive UI and built in tips for features provided by the platform.
• Notifications allow asynchronous discussion.
• Threaded conversations
• Image / document / link support
• Unlimited channels

Negatives

• Closed source
• No historic record on free service
• 90 day history